The State of the Union is #%!*@&

By James R. "Jim" Smith

The Demo-Republican alliance is destroying the our democratic system.

By Jim Smith

The Imperial President strolled through the Hall of Congress among the mortals, accompanied by members of the Blue state and Red state parties. He even deigned to take note of a few of them before mounting his throne to deliver his marching orders to the waiting dignitaries.

The Imperial trappings have advanced light years since the founding of the Republic. I don't yearn for the good-old-days when only white men with property could vote, and everyone else had an inferior status. However, the great democratization of the early 20th Century is clearly in retreat. The Congress has surrendered its warmaking power to the president, and in his Jan. 31 speech, Bush claimed to turn questions of troop withdrawal over to the military.

Early Roman emperors also retained the facade of democracy. The first emperor, Augustus, walked among the people and even ran for the office of Counsel every year (he won every time). By the time the empire had morphed into Byzantium, the emperor had a hydraulic throne that would elevate his seat high above prostrate supplicants to show his majesty. We can expect the same during the reign of Bush VI or Clinton IX.

Meanwhile, where are the people? Scared shitless that the telemarketer or tech rep you're talking to in India might be a terrorist in disguise and now the NSA knows all about it.

I'd like to talk about the content of the speech, but there wasn't much.

Bush's plea to reduce reliance on foreign oil is a clue that he + and his neo-con advisors + understand what a mess they've made of things in the Middle East.

Not only has he provoked a guerrilla war to drive the "foreign devils" out of Iraq, and the entire region but he has united most the world's population against the U.S. The Bush regime must be wishing for the good ole days in Iraq when they only had to deal with one person.

There are many metaphors in the English language to describe Bush's missteps, such as Pandora's Box, a can of worms, a sea of troubles to name a few. But that old Vietnam standby "quagmire" will do nicely. The growing demand outside the Beltway to get out of Iraq as soon as possible puts Bush in an untenable position. He can't stay and he can't leave. If the troops stay in Iraq, in reduced numbers, they will have to assume an increasingly defensive posture. The French well remember the Indochina end game, the surrender to the Viet Minh at Dien Bien Phu.

If Bush pulls out of Iraq, he is dead politically. In any democracy worthy of its name, there would be resignations up and down the civilian chain of command.

Before shedding any tears for Bush II or believing his line that "the State of the Union is good," think about what he has squandered (in addition to the number of human lives lost that are listed on page one).

Congressional appropriations by the Demopubs add up to more than $238 billion.

According to the National Priorities Project, that could have paid the annual salary of four million school teachers, built two million homes, put 31 million kids in Head Start programs, fully funded global anti-hunger efforts for nine years, or global AIDS programs for 23 years.

Sadly, the last five years have not been due only to one Texas draft-dodger run amok. The illegal invasion of Iraq, the "Patriot" Act, all the deaths and injuries and the squandering of billions of dollars could not have occurred without, at least, the passive cooperation of nearly everyone in Congress. But now, more than four years after 9/11, that act is wearing thin.

The L.A. Times conducted a nationwide poll that was reported on Jan. 27, which asked: Which party in Congress do you think has higher standards of honesty and integrity?

The responses were Republicans, 14%; Democrats, 13%; No difference, 68%; Don't know, 5%.

Hopefully, we won't get fooled again.